


Pieces of Earth

by gaslightgallows (hearts_blood)



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: Cohabitation, Developing Relationship, F/F, Feelings, Friends to Lovers, Kissing, Talking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-19
Updated: 2016-10-19
Packaged: 2018-08-23 08:06:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8320306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hearts_blood/pseuds/gaslightgallows
Summary: Rosie and Mac come to an understanding about their deepening relationship.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Heavyheadedgal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heavyheadedgal/gifts).



> For heavyheadedgal. Posting this a day early in my part of the world so you'll be able to read it the morning of the day of. 
> 
> Happiest of happy birthdays! ♥

_No bridegroom's nor crown-conqueror's mirth_  
_To mine compar'd can be:_  
_They have but pieces of earth,_  
_I've all the world in thee._  
_~ Katherine Philips_

Rosie Sanderson paused on the way up the stairs to her apartment, and watched her ‘flatmate’ as she spoke to their ground floor neighbor. Mac’s hat was tilted to one side on the coppery mass of her hair, and her tweed jacket was draped over one arm, showing off her slim shoulders and the perfectly tied cravat that complimented her waistcoat. Her face was tired, her voice was bland and polite, and it was plain to Rosie that all poor Mac wanted to do was to go upstairs and collapse. She still thought of her as ‘Mac’ when they were in public. It was safer.

Finally, old Mrs. Muller went back into her own flat, releasing Mac, who hastened up the stairs with a speed that made Rosie giggle. “Hide me,” Mac murmured, “before she comes back. I never want to hear the word ‘dyspepsia’ again.”

“Hmm, then I suppose I should keep all of my complaints to myself from now on,” Rosie teased, as they reached their apartment at last.

Mac brushed by her. “Hmph. And when have you complained to me about digestive upsets?” she demanded, tossing her hat and jacket onto a chair.

“I complain to you plenty.” Rosie grinned and relocked their front door securely.

“Not about digestive upsets. Unless that’s what you’re calling it now...” Mac’s dry humor dropped away and she opened her arms, gathering Rosie to her hungrily.

It had been some months since that they had begun keeping company together, quite seriously. Rosie had been staying with her sister Phoebe in Carleton, but not long after she and Mac began, the two of them had decided to take the flat together, for ‘convenience’s sake’. It was all very outwardly proper, with a fine parlour and two separate bedrooms. To most of her friends and to society at large – certainly to Phoebe – Ms. Sanderson and Dr. MacMillan were merely good friends. To their closest friends – to Jack, to Phryne – they were a courting couple, and that was how Rosie thought of them... even if, had Mac been a man, there was no power on earth that could have induced Rosie to set up housekeeping with her, in an unmarried state. Especially when, although so far they had slept apart, it was getting more and more difficult to hold to that propriety.

Strange, what she would dare in the face of one potential scandal but not another.

“I love you,” Rosie murmured. 

Mac stopped in mid-kiss. She held Rosie at arm’s length and contemplated her with exhausted, barely-daring-to-hope eyes. “What did you say?”

Rosie smiled. “I love you.” She wrapped a few of Mac’s curls, which had come free of their restraints, around her fingers. “Unless that’s a problem?”

“No, I...” A tiny muscle in Mac’s cheek jumped. “Rosemary, I—”

“Beth. My Beth.”

“I’ve never... you know I’ve never had anyone serious in my life. Not for long. The closest I ever came was Daisy, and – well. Brief and tragic seems to be my stock in trade, when it comes to romantic relationships. And the idea of committing to someone again, with all of that... it’s bringing out all my latent Celtic superstitions. I don’t want to tempt fate, Rosie. But...”

Rosie waited. She might have prompted Mac, but she was nothing if not patient. Her doctor was a dedicated scientist. Problems were not there to be ignored, but to be worked through. 

“I don’t _want_ anything less than what any other couple has. A partner. A lover. A companion. But we’ve both been so badly hurt, in love and in other ways, and by people we admired and trusted... that maybe it’s better if we try to keep things simple. Casual.”

But her heart wasn’t in the pronouncement, and they both knew it.

“A casual lover is one thing,” Rosie said slowly. “I’ve certainly had my share, before and during my marriage. But where there is love... I can’t be casual. The first time I slept with Jack was well before he proposed, but I knew then that he was who I wanted. The first time I slept with Mr. Fletcher, it was because it seemed like the thing to do. I’ve learned my lesson, Beth. I know when I’m making a mistake and when I’m pursuing what I want.”

“I can’t promise you forever,” Mac said, stubborn in the face of her desires, her past demons all scratching at her back. “I’m a doctor. I don’t tell pretty little lies to my patients, let alone to the woman I love.”

“I don’t want you to promise ‘forever’,” Rosie replied, her heart beginning to pound. “I don’t want you to promise anything. I’ve learned not to trust promises.”

Mac’s smile was bittersweet. “I’ve never trusted them.”

“Just give me tonight, and tomorrow, and all the nights you can manage. I won’t say no to the days as well. But you’ve never... you’ve never dealt _lightly_ with me. That’s all I ask for.”

Gently, Mac reached up and threaded her sensitive physician's fingers into Rosie’s dark hair. “I think I can give you that. You _matter_ to me, Rosemary. More than... hell, more than anything, I think. You need never doubt that.”

Then the tears came, from both of them, but the kisses in between, and after, were exquisitely tender and sweet. 

They moved Mac’s things into Rosie’s room, in the morning.


End file.
